Every organization needs to have Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) in order to minimize the chaos of daily workloads and achieve proper quality of work.
By putting Standard Operating Procedures in place, the Leadership of an organization effectively communicates their expectations to their employees. Whether they have 10 or 10,000 people working for them, writing clear SOPs is imperative for setting and reaching company goals.
What are SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures)
Standard is the expected level of quality or attainment. It can also be a collective ideal, measurable objective, or model in comparative evaluations.
Operation is the productive course of any industry activity.
Procedure is an established way of performing a task.
Why Are They Important?
If you were to show up to a job and were told the following, how would you react and how would it make you feel? “Here is your desk, now I want you to achieve the metric we spoke about in your interview”. The Manager leaves you at your desk to fend for yourself.
I have personally experienced this in past employment. It made me feel like no one cared about my personal success, I did not feel valued. I also felt nervous, I had some working knowledge of the process, but I had no idea what I needed to do to achieve my goals.
With SOPs in place, new hires will know daily operations and how to be successful. Making procedures standard ensures your employees can help each other if someone has a question. When you give everyone the same information, you guarantee tasks are getting done correctly.
Think about recruiting for example, if there was no interview process template (SOP) to operate by, as a manager, you would not be able to gauge your employees’ performance towards their goals. A SOP gives a set of measurable tasks that can be evaluated (audited) against.
SOPs will also help you stay compliant and in accordance with the Law, keeping you and your company out of legal trouble. Adherence to SOPs shouldn’t be viewed as a hindrance but as a tool for identify training needs or parts of the process that may need reviewed.
SOPs are a very important part of how everyone operates day-to-day in any position. Even as a manager, if you aren’t sure of certain procedure steps, refer back to the set of SOPs you were given in your initial training. Even the most skilled people have to refer back to the basics.
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